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Wednesday, April 29, 2015

If you are in Cochin and looking out for a nice place where
you are served with good patisserie, assorted bread and savory, then French Toast is the
place to be. It’s a nice little quaint place with good ambience, pleasing
service, good music, a great place to hang out and serves a varied menu. Their
signature desserts are divine and innovative. The ingredients used are
handpicked, fresh and imported. I would highly recommend this place if you are
looking freshness and quality.

Let’s get to know more from Ayaz Salim, the owner of French Toast

Tell us a little bit about yourself. What made you
want to open up French Toast? Did you have any formal training in setting up
your café?

​I was working in advertising for close to 12 years
in the Middle East, my father who is also in the food industry in Dubai was the
one who planted the seed in my head, so salman (my younger brother) and I
started French toast back in 2011. We were clear back then that we wanted to
give people good food (whatever the cost). I have not had any formal training
in baking or culinary arts, but have a lot of on work training. However the
people we employ are all well trained chefs from all over the world.

What inspired the name French Toast?

​Both Salman and I used to eat a lot of French toast
growing up, and the concept of French toast appealed to us (the fact that stale
bread is dipped in egg and reinvented in the form of a beautiful dish
essentially avoiding any wastage and being sustainable.) hence the name. ​

What sets you apart from the others?

Here are a few pointers that sets us apart

We are amongst a handful of cafes / restaurants who
use ingredients like belgian couverture chocolate (to give you an idea about
how rare it is, in a city like Bombay there are only two places who use pure
chocolate like us, the hyatt and another award winning patisserie called la
foilie) - after we launched more people in cochin have started using and
talking about Belgian chocolate etc, however they still only use it for one or
two of their cakes instead of the entire menu.

Our processes are totally different from regular
commercial kitchens, for instance everyone in Kerala uses cake gels and sponge
mixes to create their sponge, these mixes are pre made and sent from Europe/ India
etc, however these contain a high amount of chemical preservatives to survive
our climate and conserve nutrition but are harmful to our bodies
over the long term.We on the other hand, create everything from
scratch, that means if we make a jaconde sponge then we buy almonds, crush and
grind them, extract the powder and use that as the base to make a cake, this is
why for instance the MONT BLANC takes about 18 hours to make (including setting
time)

We are the most copied bakery in Kerala (there
are already atlas 8 to 9 bakeries that copy our products and there is one that
blatantly copied our Mont blanc by picking up one of our pastry chefs, what
this means is that other people also believe in our products as much as we do.

​We are the only bakery in Kerala that is
preservative free; this means that our products are best for diabetic patients,
heart patients etc.

If I walk into your café, what is the one thing I
should order and eat?

​I always struggle to suggest, when you say the one
thing you should order and eat all I can recommend is what most people like,
say the Mont blanc or our gouda cheese frenchtoast or strawberry frenchtoast or
even the banoffee pie. However my personal favorite is the almond pear tart or
the salted caramel tart (which most people would find hideous because of
chocolate / salt combination) ​

Describe your space in 3 words

​PRESERVATIVE FREE FOOD​

What advice would you give to someone who is
dreaming of opening their own café?

​Chances of you becoming a doctor are more than say
succeeding in running your own cafe, that’s because the amount of personal
discipline and domain knowledge required to open a cafe is much more than what
people think, but everyone seems to take it lightly because our country does
not have a culinary culture like say France or even Australia. ​

Any future plans of opening up another café?

​We are opening two in Kakanad by close of March, and
looking for franchisees in Calicut. ​

Thursday, April 16, 2015

I embarked on a quest to find my creative side… and slowly
ventured into acrylic painting. I recently finished my first art piece and it
gave me a sense of accomplishment in creating something beautiful and to see
the happiness it brings to someone else and love the painting, is the most
fulfilling compliment I can ever ask.

So here goes my first art piece... definitely not perfect but happy with what I have created

I always believe that we all have some hidden talents that
we need to tap. God has gifted us in many ways and it’s up to us to cultivate
our talent. And I hope you all get to do the same. Discover your passion and do more of what
makes you happy. And if you have already done so, then just enjoy every minute of it.

Wednesday, April 15, 2015

Today I am visually drawn towards Supriya
Murthy’s aesthetic home, because there is inspiration everywhere. She is the talented
co-author of Aalayam Inspiration, a blog that I adore. Her home is
predominantly ethnic with memories and stories attached to it. I love the way she created a symphony of colours, fabrics and décor pieces.

Please scroll down to enjoy the home
tour and hear from Supriya herself as she shares with us on where she got her
inspiration to decorate her home.

Supriya:

Our home incorporates global design elements that are
not necessarily conformist! The palettes range from ornate Indian furniture
with vibrant textural softscaping to irreverent Bohemian chotchkies combined
with quirky antique chic! This decor scheme blends form and function, and works
like a charm for moving stuff around based on mood and occasion. The featured
snapshots of my living space epitomize my style philosophy "let the room
speak for you!"

Color is synonymous with inspiration to me. I derive my joie de vivre everyday looking at a palette of vibrant colors in my living space - whether on the walls, on the bookshelf or on kitschy cushions thrown around all my rooms! When I moved to the USA, I was very keen on bringing back a piece of Indian flavor - fabrics and decor pieces, with me to infuse color into my first apartment! These pieces have traveled with me through two apartments, a Masters degree and two babies, into our current home. The cushion covers (the colorful patch work ones you see in the pictures) are dog eared and worse for wear! But I love them! Because those are the first things ever that I bought for MY own living space!

I have always been attracted to traditional accessories,
masks and sculptures and antique, generational serve ware. In today's
modern homes, I feel it’s vital to use every opportunity there is to bringing that
antiquity in! I have tried to infuse ethnic color via the russet tones of bronze
and gold, conveniently providing both design and function throughout the house.

Finally, a story to finish off my color splash! I
pepper our home with my favorite accessories bought from street vendors back
home in India. One particularly charming fellow was trying to put his kid
through school, and I have brought many a thing from him, sometimes needlessly.

I have bought wind chimes and dancing puppets that you see in our home, for their gorgeous workmanship, the beautiful colors and to commemorate his heartwarming entrepreneurial spirit! These gorgeous things, and the memories hang proudly in many sunny corners in our home, reminding me of my real roots...far far away!

Thanks Supriya for sharing your
beautiful space with us. It definitely quenched my thirst for a beautiful home
tour!!

Click here to hop on to her
beautiful blog called Aalayam Inspiration, a blog that is filled with
inspirations to take away.

Monday, April 13, 2015

Today I’d like to introduce you to a food stylist and a food
blogger, Himanshu Taneja, whose work speaks for his passion for food. His
gorgeous blog, “The White Ramekins”, is filled with rustic pictures and earthy
style photography with simple recipes. To me his blog is just… therapeutic…

Let’s get to know more from Himanshu himself. Please scroll
down to view his beautiful pictures and read the interview.

Tell us something about yourself. And what inspired you
to start your food blog? And why the name "The White Ramekins”?

I am an easy going and fun loving person who likes to
spend his time with his friends and family. At the hindsight I am a hardcore
techie guy who works for a finance company. My connection from food start from
the days of my early years, when I used to help out my mother in kitchen. I got
my learning from her, observing her making food for the family. But I never
cooked my meal on my own until I moved to another city and started living by
myself. The White Ramekins started a couple of years ago out of a sheer
encouragement from a very dear friend, while we both were baking some muffins
at home (all by trial and error) in my convection microwave. We were so
thrilled to see that we could also have baked. And we baked the same recipe
again and again for next few weeks. By that time, I had started following
Nigella Lawson and Rachel Allen on television. And also, I had been reading a
couple of very good food blogs such as 101Cookbooks, La Tartine Gourmand,
Tartlette and Passionate About Baking. There style of food writing and food
photography has always remained an inspiration. While I created my blog, I
wanted to give it a name which defines what I am really passionate about doing.
It had to be related to food, or baking if I be more precise. So, I named my
blog on the name of the white ceramic ramekins in which I baked my first trial
of those muffins. And it just clicked that way.

How do you juggle between your career in finance and
blogging?

As I say, I am a hardcore techie person, who loves to
write those endless lines of code with same amount of passion the way he likes
to bake, style and shoot his creations in the kitchen. So I have never found it
challenging switching the hats of a programmer and a food blogger, however
crazy it might sound. :) Honestly speaking, I generally spend my weekends
around blogging, which includes, deciding onto recipes, sourcing of ingredients,
cooking/baking, prop shopping, planning about photo shoot, food styling,
photography, editing and finally pushing that onto the blog.

Have you had any formal training in Cooking or Food
Styling?

No, I haven’t had any formal training in cooking or food
styling. I get inspired from so many amazing food bloggers and other artists’s
whose work I follow. The web is full of inspirations and learning resources.

Your photographs depict your passion for food and food styling. And you have a
great eye for colour. How important is food presentation?

Thank you. You are very sweet. I think food presentation
is as important as the taste of the dish. It perks up the experience of having
an awesome preparation, if it is aesthetically appealing too. And it becomes
all the more important for the virtual world, where your audience are
experiencing the taste of your preparations through their eyes only. Present
the dish in not so pleasing appearance, chances are that your effort and hard
work you have put into bringing it up together will not be noticed.

How do you innovate in your cooking? Do you mostly
experiment in your cooking?

My style of cooking is completely inspired by the
seasonal produce available. I am very much into idea of adding seasonal fruits
and vegetables in my cakes and bakes. And I am on constant lookout for new
fruits and vegetables which appear in the market by the change in season. I
think the magic a seasonal and fresh produce can bring to your food and the
styling is unmatched.

Do you have other passions or hobbies apart
from cooking, blogging and photography?

Apart from cooking, blogging and photography, I like to
listen to classical music and sometimes can hum a tune or a song, if my friends
insist.

What is your advice for someone who wants to start a food
blog? And any photography tips for fellow bloggers?

Follow your heart and dive in, are my two cents for the
fellow bloggers. As far as photography is concerned, I am still a learner. I am
not sure, if I am right person to talk about on this subject. But to start
with, I think one should be clear about handling a DSLR camera in manual mode.
That gives one enough comfort in playing with light, which is a crucial thing
to consider in food photography. The texture and the appearance of food is what
makes an image stand out and light is the key factor to bring in that magic. It
can’t be neglected. And the other thing is about getting inspired, which will
help you identify your own style one day.

Any future plans? Can we expect a cookbook?

I have many plans which keep on playing on my mind. That
varies from running food styling workshops to writing a cookbook, but nothing
is conclusive right now. Let’s see what destiny has in store for
me.

Click here to head over to The White Ramekins and here to get updates from facebook.

Thanks Himanshu for sharing your passion with us and more
importantly for being an inspiration!

About Me

I am Rachel, based in Oman. My Blog is all about things that I am passionate about, interiors and celebration of design. I never realized that my obsession for home décor, food and other interests would lead me to writing a blog. I hope my blog is filled with pictures and websites that you can access easily and give you a global feel with my handpicked collections. Please drop a mail to tbinspirations@gmail.com if you wish to get in touch or comment.